During a recession, its always good to think outside of the box, and upstart art consultancy …

“Patterns in brain activity can be used to determine whether someone is looking at a surrealist landscape by Salvador Dali or the cubist lines of Pablo Picasso.” New Scientist 11/26/09

Set up in 2004 by the Arts Council, Own Art enables people to take home a piece of contemporary art straight way but then pay for it in 10 monthly interest-free instalments, borrowing anything up to £2,000. So far the scheme has made over 14,500 loans to purchase art valued in excess of £11.6 million. The Telegraph (UK) 11/30/09

“Built between 1970 and 1972, Shift was commissioned by Toronto art collector Roger Davidson on land owned by his family until its sale to developers around 1980. Since then, virtually no maintenance or repair has been done on Shift ’s six zigzagging walls, each 1.5 metres high and 20 centimetres thick.” The Globe & Mail (Canada) 11/28/09

In a recent holiday outlook report, Sarah Rotman Epps of Forrester, a research and business-consulting firm, predicted yearly sales of 3 million e-readers by the end of 2009, noting that e-reader sales reached 1 million in 2008. “With 30 percent of sales occurring in the holiday season,” Forrester’s report added, “we expect sales in 2010 to double.” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette 11/30/09